They are pretty surprising as they are 3-4 inches long. They have 5 pairs of legs plus more "arms" in the font. They have a little red horn on their ends. They can devour the leaves and unripened tomatoes on a plant very quickly (which they did to ours, but luckily the plant was about done producing anyway)
They will "cocoon" in the soil and then come out a moth in the Spring (although our potted plant will be removed before then) The moths are one of the fasted flying insects and can fly 30 mph.
I may have been more amazed than anyone else in the family, but Westley at least acted interested. Will was scared of them and cried and clung to me as we observed them.
After learning about them, I gave Westley paper and green and black to draw one of the hornworm caterpillars as he observed them. He doesn't really like to make representational drawings, but I think after he did so he was proud of it as he immediately hung it on the fridge
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